The BIG Picture…

Ever since I was a little boy, I have always wanted to know the “plan.” When we took family vacations I eagerly wanted to know when and where we were going to stop along the way. When plans were altered I would not be a “happy camper”, as they say. Which brings up another point about me, I am moody and can be cranky as well. We’ll save that for another blog as I haven’t yet realized anything revolutionary from being moody. Back to knowing the plan, God continues to tell, or rather show me He’s the one with the plan.

I recently had a couple job interviews which I did not get. I thought God was opening a door for me to get a better job so that I might be able to better provide for my wife and child. Not getting job after job, I was questioning God’s plan for my life and wondering if there was any rhyme or reason. Idiot. This is a perfect picture of how little we see of His big picture. He is the potter that etches away at us, the clay, to make us into the people he ultimately wants us to be. He shapes and redirects me through trials. I can picture him molding and shaping me into something so beautiful. I put “ugly” or impurities upon his attempt at creating this perfect image by sinning and not following the will he has laid upon my life. He is the perfecter from the image in which I have stained. He is trying to move me in the right direction by chiseling away at my creation. My trials hurt as He painfully chisels my body, although this pain is what grows me. I hopefully become a better person because of his blows against my body. I love coming to the realization of his blows and seeing that they are meant for good. I see why he doesn’t want me to have the jobs I’ve applied for. I wondered, if he were a good God, why would he not want to allow me to get a job that will enable me to provide for my wife and child? I now see that he wants me to be a stay-at-home dad. If only he would have shown me earlier.  Just kidding about the last part.

God’s timing is perfect. By God blessing Alinna and I with a little girl right now couldn’t have been more perfect. Looking back at the past year, it makes sense. I can’t see what’s going on with job stuff, but I know that Alinna and I have endured so much our first year of marriage that Ruby is going to be out little gift at the one year anniversary of our marriage. I can’t really find the words to say that all the transition thus far in marriage has led us to be able to adapt to having a baby. I’ll probably write again about this, but for now I encourage every newly married couple to welcome this transitional phase of life with arms wide open.

Going on with job stuff…it has been painful to hear that “I’m not a good fit” for a particular position that I know fully well I would rock out, but God has other plans that I need to understand I don’t understand right now. I know a year from now we will look back and see the bigger picture for what God had in store for us and it will all make sense. Socrates had it right when he said, “I know that I know nothing.” The beauty is that God knows. We must continue to take his blasts on our body/character/lives/etc. as something that is painful for the time being but will hopefully produce righteousness later on, if and only if we follow him and abide by His will.

Three Things…

I’ve often asked others the question, “If there were three things to make sure you did every day, what would they be and why?”  I need to remind myself of these things because let’s face it, I get caught up in the mundane and sometimes forget.  Three things I would make sure to do everyday would be…1) Laugh.  I hate it when I go a day without laughter.  I had a great dinner the other night with some friends and laughed so hard I cried.  That doesn’t happen often with me and I can only think of a handful of people that have truly made me laugh this hard.  This is something that I wish happened more often.  After all, someone once said, “laughter is an instant vacation.”  2) Stop and Reflect.  To me, it’s so important to take a break from the norm and reflect on life.  Turn off the TV, cell phone, computer, IPod, or whatever it is that adds noise to our lives.  This is something that is a little easier for me because I don’t mind solitude and quietness but for some people it may be such a challenge to lock yourself in a quiet room for 30 minutes.  I think our minds need this kind of sharpening as well.  I think it’s so good to evaluate life and analyze relationships going on around us.  Why are we doing the things we do?  Are we the person we’ve always imagined ourselves being or do we need to redirect?  What expectations do we have for the next years out?  What can we do to change the world around us instead of being changed by the world?  How can we better experience Christ?  How can we love better?  How can we lessen more of ourselves and increase more of Christ?  3) Have An Experience In Nature.  I love the idea of simply going outside for at least a little bit each and every day.  I think it’s important to keep the child-like behavior that we once had.  Unless of course you are one of those children who grew up playing computer games all the time, then I am truly sorry.  Just because we are grown up doesn’t mean that we have to stop going into the woods and jumping over creeks.  I experience Christ in the wilderness.  I think that’s one of the reasons I love surfing and being around the ocean.  It allows me to combine my passion with my penchant for pragmatism.  I can be in the deep, cold, ocean water while gazing into the sun and moutains surrounding me while knowing He created ALL of it.  To me, there’s just something spiritual about it that I can’t explain.  Anyway, these are three things I would do everyday and will encourage my children to do.  I think I would be a better and more enjoyable person to be around if these things happened each day and happened early on.  I’m interested though, what would your three things be and why?

What’s on Your Minds…

You fill in the blank

Life is…

The Element of Surprise

Where to start?  If anyone reads this blog anymore, as it has been over a year since I have written anything, you are now finding that Alinna and I are pregnant!  I arose one morning last week only to drink some coffee and telephone some friends on the East coast.  I spoke with a good friend who usually asks: “You pregnant yet?”.  I figured I’d beat him to the punch and ‘jokingly’ tell him Alinna and I are pregnant.  I had no idea that Alinna would come home later only to tell me that she thinks we’re pregnant.  So, three pregnancy tests later, we found out we’re as pregnant as we were when she took the first test.  Why does it seem that we all think the first one is wrong?  God has such a sense of humor.  He knew when I was talking to my friend that I was dead wrong about being pregnant.  I can picture Him laughing the very moment those words fell out of my mouth.  He not only knew we were going to have a kid before I woke that very morning, but He knew before Alinna said “I Do” and before my mom had me in 1983.  “He knows the plans he has for us.”

When Alinna came home and dropped the bomb on me, I was filled with excitement and shock!  The instance at which financial worries popped into my head, I was instantly reminded of God’s provision for us in the last four months of marriage.  We moved to California in June with tons of questions, a couple answers, God, and each other.  He’s provided me with a job, a car, Alinna a job, a roof over our head, another roof over our head when our apartment wasn’t ready move into when we moved here and so on.  I have NO DOUBT in my mind that HE WILL provide for us in the future.  I try to remember the past, not dwelling on it, live in the present as best I know how, and trust God with the future, not dwelling on that either.  I’ve been reminded of so many lessons this past week that are helping me feel calm and relaxed about the present as well as the future.  It’s not bad or wrong to ask God questions.  We see Habbakuk ask God some tough questions and how God doesn’t let them go unanswered.  Each morning I can wake to have the world hit me in the face by ALLOWING wonder and worry to fill my head.  Why now with a kid?  How are we going to provide when we can hardly afford to live without a kid?  Can I put aside myself enough for God, a wife, AND a kid?  Does having a kid mean I must give up on my dreams and move to a more comfortable life in North Carolina? It’s God’s plan and timing, not my own.  One of my favorite C.S. Lewis quotes from Mere Christianity:

“That is why the real problem of the Christian life comes where people do not usually look for it. It comes the very moment you wake up each morning. All your wishes and hopes for the day rush at you like wild animals. And the first job each morning consists simply in shoving them all back; in listening to that other voice, taking the other point of view, letting that other larger, stronger, quieter life come flowing in. And so on, all day. Standing back from all you natural fussings and frettings; coming in out of the wind.”

We may think we know the plan, but when we think we do, he’s right behind to say, “Oh, no you don’t.”  Although I wish he would answer these questions with neon signs, he never does. We all know God doesn’t want life to be a cake walk. I think he wants us to walk into the fire, step out into the deep blue ocean, be imprisoned for His sake, leave our families and grow up! All in all, I’ve asked God questions this past week and a half, and though he hasn’t flashed answers my way, Alinna and I are seeing answers as we live in His will.

Alinna and I decided to remain in California and be a Light out here in the community of Oceanside, CA. Thanks to her for being a fantastic wife that allows to me to pursue my dreams while standing by my side through everything.

Straining Toward the Goal…

This morning’s sermon was, in my opinion, extremely good.  First of all, I love Banner Elk and am growing to love the pastor more and more.  I continue to see great qualities in him like humility, joy, patience, and much more.  I’ll move on from him because I’m not trying to share about how amazing this church or pastor is.  He spoke on Philippians 3:10-16 which involves straining toward the goal.  I love Paul and I love when he relates our Christian walk with a race.  Since running a half marathon last semester and wanting to continue and run a full marathon this summer I had to have knee surgery.  This has left me unable to run or jump from now on and maybe that’s why I paid closer attention when my pastor asked the question: “Who has ever run a long distance run before?”  Then he spoke and I could relate this sermon differently after having run thirteen miles last semester with some of my roommates.  I jotted down seven things that hit me at the end of the sermon.  A lot of them were reiterations from previous sermons on the same topic, but like I said it is different after actually having run a long race before.  I encourage everyone who hasn’t run a long distance reace before to do so.  The races are so fun and the event itself is worth going to just to cheer on other runners and be a part of the community.  Anyway, after this sermon was over I felt inspired to write.

The first thing I wrote was the word Confidence.  We must not be cocky when we run or train, but we must have confidence that we will finish.  We should not train with any sort of pride or arrogance, although we should be steadfast and confident in how we train and how we finish.  Secondly, I wrote Training and Perseverance.  This is pretty self-explanatory.  If we persevere, then we do not give up and we train with much discipline.  Next, I wrote Not Looking Back, but Forward.  Paul says, “One thing I do: Forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead…”  Relating this to a real race, there is no way I would ever think about going back to re-run the first mile over again for the heck of it.  I kept looking ahead and focused on my running.  I tried to stay focused on where I was going to place my next step and this is key in life that we keep going forward.  Christ looked ahead and endured for the joy that was set before Him.  Another thing that runners do is Encourage one another.  My pastor did a funny demonstration about passing runners and saying, “You’re not gonna make it man” and how this never happens in a race.  Everyone running is saying, “You can do it” and “Keep it up.”  By about mile eight I was ready to give up and start walking.  My roommate who was pacing with me had just left me and I began to feel the tiredness of my legs and the weight upon me.  I met someone that morning before the race and we were talking about our pasts and whatnot when he began to pass me pretty steadily.  He saw me and slowed down to encourage me and let me pace off him before he took off .  I know he slowed down to do this because of how fast he was already going and I knew I had that look on my face that about to give up, which he clearly saw.  I don’t think how much he knew how much he meant to me.  We all have people like this in our own lives and it speaks volumes when someone slows down their own life to give some encouragement.  Another thing I wrote was We’re All at Different Courses Along the Race.  One truth is that we all have different walks.  The race I ran was in Wilmington, NC and I was imagining the runners crossing the finish line while I was about half way through.  Some people are further along than others and some experience different at different times.  Like I said, it was me that was probably half way through whereas others were finishing.  The next thing I wrote was that The Last Gets the Loudest Praise.  It doesn’t matter when we finish, it matters that we finish.  By the way, the last one to finish truly does get the loudest praise and it’s nice to relate heaven like this.  We don’t get more for finishing faster or slower.  The last word I wrote was Finisher.  At the end of the race we received a medal that read finisher.  We don’t get ranked right when we finish.  All we need to do is be a finisher to get the medal! 

Anyway, I always love hearing this race analogy!  At the end of my days, all I want is for God to say, “Well done good and faithful servant!”  After all, we have a great cloud of witnesses cheering us on.  It is sad, yet true, when we look around and see people losing their passion and dropping out of the race.  People do drop out.  I do believe Jesus puts it well when He says, “For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few” (Matthew 7:14).

Simply Nothing Would Be Nice Sometimes…

Lately I’ve been having thoughts that won’t leave my mind for weeks.  They’ve come mostly from reading and then pondering and not being able to rest until an answer is found.  Sometimes, there is no answer, which I’ve found to be good in some cases.  I basically feel like my mind battles different issues which eventually brings me closer to God, but at the present time it is seemingly painful.  Why is it that I think as I do?  Why can’t I focus on the truths alreadylaid out and be at peace in my mind?  Maybe it helps me define who God is to me, maybe others will learn from what I write, or maybe it molds me into who God wants me to be.  Regardless, I hope God is using my thoughts for some reason past myself.  I realized that I should encourage these challenging thoughts and that I shouldn’t be complacent or satisfied with a question-free sort of walk.  I don’t want to question things for the sake of questioning.  I feel like there must be a balance of questioning things with pure motives and meditating for long periods of time on them as well as taking things by faith and seeing the pure majesty of God and then moving on in life.

On Truth…

Since about a week ago, after writing about all of my Godly wisdom He has bestowed upon me (sarcasm added), I have been thinking about something else.  Sometimes I think myself crazy.  I know that it has to do much with all the propaganda circulating in the world today.  We get so much information from so many different perspectives it is insane.  We live in a much different society than our parents did.  I believe it is safe to say that so much has changed by how we relate within our cirlce of friends, familes, churches, etc.  For example, we want friends who are “real”, whatever that means, and we can’t stand when people who are “fake”.  We can’t bring people a pamphlet that explains the gospel in four simple laws.  We make things much more complex nowadays.  We must meet people where they’re at and in a relational way.  So, we create so many different avenues to reach God and provide so many books that reach all types of people.  Technological advances are good, but it is distancing “youngsters” (wow, I’m old) from having true relationships.  We all want to be known and loved by others which is why relationships are so key nowadays.  At the same time, technology is hendering our community by distancing relationships through instant messenger, text messages, facebook and so on.  Ultimately, it is us who hender our own relationships because it was us who created these things.  So yea, we humans are ultimately the problem, but that’s not what I’m getting at.  Don’t get me wrong, I think we do need to reach people where they’re at and that relational methods of doing this is what it is going to take for this generation.  I also think we must not, as I do, get so mixed up with ALL that is out there.  Sorry for going off on a tangent about facebook and what not.  My point was that society is changing and that is the direction I feel that it is headed.

Back to my learning about propaganda and how there is so much out there.  Relating this to God, I think that it is good that there are many avenues out there reaching to God, but I can get so caught up in ideas and theories that I really end up driving myself crazy in thought.  I have been reading a book lately about 10 Lies The Church Tells To Women.  It is challenging book that encourages me to think critically about women in the church.  I believe this author’s arguments are weak and taken out of context though.  He also makes many assumptions and generalizations about Pauls view towards women in the church.  Is this the false doctrine that Paul warns about in Timothy?  I don’t know, I just think it is ironic that this book is about lies dealing with Paul who warns about lies we are told by people like this author.  This is just one way that we see false doctrine.  I’m just glad that I have scripture already there to fall back on.  My worry and concern is for people who believe what they read out of books and make it their own theology.  So what happens when the world teaches false doctrine by the very people we look up too, for example, teachers, coaches, friends, parents, pastors, etc.?  The only answer I have is, take it to scripture.  With all that is out in the world today, it is very easy for us to be tossed and turned by society.  This is why we can’t just take someone a pamphlet with total truth anymore, because of the fifty others that are filled with partial lies or total lies.  There are so many false pamphlets out there already circulating and some people are onto this, whereas other are not and they’ll believe the first thing they read in a book.  We must learn real Truth to fall back.  We must truly see the Word as a lamp unto our feet.  I only wish I viewed the Word like this more often.  Solomon, with all his wisdom, was on to something when he said in Ecclesiastes chapter 12…

“Of making many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness of the flesh.  The end of the matter; all has heard.  Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man”

We must take all things to scripture, even if they are preached in a church.  Even in the book of Acts, we see the people examing the scripture with what Paul preaches.  These people were good and right to examine what Paul said with scripture.  This can be related to nowadays by what I here from John Piper.  You would think because of his position, just as Pauls, we should believe everything he says.  I couldn’t really imagine hearing Paul back in the day with a Bible next to me and really examining what he said.  I would probably take everything he said as truth, although we can learn something from these people in Acts.  The truth is we can all distort scripture and we shouldn’t just take things people say or write at face value.  Basically, there is a lot of good and evil out there in the world.  We can’t get caught up in the lies and grey areas.  We must strive to know Truth because the Bible is filled more with that than anything else.  It can be seen as extremely deep, although I love more than anything the simplistic things it offers.  For example, when Solomon simply says, “fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.”  In saying some of these things about society and whatnot, I’m interested in whether you agree or not.  Let me know what you think as you read my thoughts and ramblings, I’d love to know.  

On Knowledge…

Recently, I have been thinking about my knowledge of God or lack there of. Before I go on, I will preface this post by saying that I do not fully think myself to be a total idiot and that I am not given knowledge and wisdom obtaining to God. I feel as if I have some sort of understanding of who He is, but not as much as I’d like to know.

I desire a deeper knowledge of God and I desire pure motives for seeking Him. I’ve been convicted of my lack of knowledge and my desires for wanting to know Him more deeply. God is not by any means an easy person for me to understand and that’s obviously how it should be. He wouldn’t be a good God if we could totally understand Him. We had a Bible study this week on “The Glory of God”. One of the chief ways in which God receives glory is through us, but ultimately Himself. I fail to give Him the glory that is due His name by how I even desire to know about Him. It sadens me that I seek Him for impure knowledge or in other words, simply being able to spout out answers about God when I’m involved in spiritual conversations. As I took a walk that I’ll never forget this past weekend with my father, I saw that he has Godly wisdom and knowledge. The way he talked of Christ on the cross was not that of, “oh I know the answer to this question”, as I sometimes think. It was a sort of, “Oh that is the man I eagerly want to know and love with all my heart and life. It is the man I live for and would die for as well”. It just convicted me in the sense that I sometimes get off track as far as my reasons for reading the Word. Is His Word something I value as a letter that tells me about the lover of my life, or is it a book that gives me answers to questions people ask? Is it loving the creator of all things that I seek to know him or is it simply getting to know him through my desire for knowledge? Relating it back to His glory, God gives wisdom and knowledge to us so that he can be glorified. Paul says it best in Ephesians 1:17- “The God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him…” In short, He gives us wisdom to know Himself. That makes total sense when you think about it. It wouldn’t make sense any other way if His glory is what matters most to Him. When I desire knowledge instead of God I distance myself from Him, but when I desire God and God alone, he gives so much more! It reminds me of the famous C.S. Lewis quote, “Put first things first and we get second things thrown in; put second things first and we lose both the first and the second things”. This has proven to be true time and time again. One last reason not to desire selfish knowledge is simply that when I die, is it going with me to heaven?  Will it really matter how much I have built in my head (as well as money, material things, etc.) when all that’s gonna happen is that I die one day and it’s left here on earth to to be forgotten.  I’m thankful for the grace of God. I’m thankful for His great and weighty glory. I am thankful for the little, mechanical things that I do understand about Him, like repentence and what it means to have faith in Him. I am also thankful for the deeper meanings that I do not understand about Him, like why He lavishes His love upon me, a sinner, and how He let His son come to earth as a man and let Him die. I’m thankful for the way that He allows us to learn from mistakes and that He gives us Truth to fall back on. I’m thankful for the wisdom He gives to know Him more.  I’m thankful for dry times and when I think I have it all together, as well as the spiritually growthful times and when I know that I don’t know.

“We know that all of us possess knowledge. This knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. If anyone imagines that he knows something, he does not yet know as he ought to know. But if anyone loves God, he is known by God” ~1 Corinthians 8:1-3

A Change of Pace…

So, I haven’t any profound thoughts here.  I simply wanted to say that Christmas break was among my favorites this year.  Its seems to me that every time I go home, I learn more about my family and myself.  This Christmas was filled with family, friends, and fun experiences.  First of all, I’m continuing to learn that family and friends are essential in life.  They keep me accountable, challenge me, build me up, let me down, and everything inbetween.  I like what Donald Miller says in his book, To Own A Dragon, “Relationships unlock certain parts of who we are supposed to be”.  I’m fortunate enough to have my family together and I don’t take it for granted.  I’m thankful for them because they know everything about me and yet, they still love me.  They are there for me and I them.  A truth I keep learning over and over is that we can’t make it through life on our own.  If you can’t tell from other things I’ve learned on my blog, I like to have control over my life and do things on my own.  This was learned, again, the hard way as I had an unexpected knee surgery on December 28th.  I’m thankful for my family and friends that they were there and will be there to serve me as my leg heals.  Things could be much worse though regarding my leg.  A family friend of ours lost her mom, dad, and two brothers in a plane crash between Christmas and New Years.  It just makes me think about how many unexpected things come our way in life.  We either end up letting these little (my knee) or big (losing an entire family) cirumstances control us or we seek God through them and let Him come in and take control in the way He knows best.  So, do I let my circumstances master me or is it the other way around?  I’ve learned a lot from having this knee surgery and am continuing to learn so much.  Basically, go give your mom, dad, grandparent, whoever it is that is there for you a hug and tell them you love them, you may not always get the chance to.  Real deep, I know.

One last thing that has been on my mind over the break is children.  Some friends of mine back home are at the stage in life where they’re starting to have kids.  The main response I get from asking them what they’ve learned from having a child is that they never expected to love their child instantly from birth.  We grow to love others as I’m learing now, yet all that child needs to do is be born.  As my friend said, “It’s wierd how you can love someone so much without having them earn your love or anything.  I’d take a bullet for her after only knowing her for a few seconds.”  All this talk made me think of how much God loves us.  This picture of perfect, instant, unselfish, steadfast, limitless love is a glimpse of God’s love for us.  All we needed to do for Him to love us is be born.  This makes me feel so safe and secure that he lavishes His love upon me like this.  “We love because he first loved us”.

1 John 4:7-21

On Obedience…

Something that’s been on my mind lately is my adequacy about my preparedness to serve God.  I’m willing to serve God with my life, yet I feel like I need to be more knowledgable about God, more mature in my faith, and have a more loving heart for my neighbor to do so.  The fact is, this kind of thinking is false.  There are day old, teenage Christians overseas who are planting churches and saving souls by serving God with there lives.  I’m mature enough and well trained enough to share the gospel anywhere and everywhere.  Anyone who has the Holy Spirit is equiped enough to help God bring people to himself.  Knowing this, why do I feel like I need more training to be sent out?  In high school, I invisioned myself being trained to take what I learned into college.  Now that I’m in college I feel like I’m being prepared again for something greater when I graduate.  When I graduate, am I still going to feel inadequate to serve God?  I hope not!  It’s not about being knowledgable, it’s about being obedient to the life in which we’ve been called.  Thinking on these things brings up two spiritual truths: God can make a ’somebody’ out of a ‘nobody’ and nothing is impossible for God.

So, we all know how God can turn a ‘nobody’ into a ’somebody’.  He does it all throughout the Bible.  For example, just look at Moses, David, Solomon, and the list goes on and on.  Even in the New Testament, he uses tax collector’s, fishermen, and murderer’s.  It’s almost harder to find a case where God uses someone who is established in the community, who has been trained for years to share the gospel and plant churches.  I need to believe this whole heartedly and not doubt or underestimate what God can do.  I mustn’t limit God’s ability to do the impossible regarding me and ministry.  When I doubt myself, I doubt God.  He gave us a ‘Helper’, the Holy Spirit, so I might as well use Him.  The thing is, when I assume it’s my knowledge that brings people to God, I come across as better than the Holy Spirit.  I can’t control whose soul gets saved or not.  Therefore, why should I hold back or think I’m insufficient for being used for the kingdom?  Basically, I need to remember that God can do anything and use anyone to bring people to himself!

“Who brings princes to nothing, and makes the rulers of the earth as emptiness”  Isaiah 40:23 

“For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth.  But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might not boast in the presence of God.  He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, whom God made our wisdom and our righteousness and sanctification and redemption.  Therefore, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”"  1 Corinthians 1:26-31